When you conduct your competitive analysis, it's worth analyzing the sales models of your competitors. In his article Three SaaS Sales Models, Joel York describes the three most common SaaS sales models based on the relationship between price and product complexity. Companies with low priced and low-complexity products must focus on developing a self-service option so they can maintain a healthy relationship between customer acquisition cost (CAC) and customer lifetime value (CLV). Slack, Trello, Dropbox, GitHub are all low-price, low-complexity products.

I remember my very first week working at Hanapin Marketing. I was working in a REDBOP group (for information on what REDBOP is, see “super awesome opportunity” in the dictionary and you will find information on Hanapin’s monthly PPC training program) and we were tasked with explaining to the rest of the team the differences between tactics and strategy. Easy peasy. Strategy = plan. Tactics = action.
In order to get more specific with our audience, we set up our targeting to focus on those people that Facebook says are interested in moving. We narrow our age range slightly to exclude those too young to (probably) be looking to sell their home, and also include some demographic and behavioral targeting traits. We target those who are “likely to move” and those within a range of incomes and net worths that we like:

Another method is to track your competitors’ links. Content marketing is often done in unison with link building. Your competitors most likely create content on blogging sites. Within the articles they submit, there are external backlinks that point back to their own websites. Those links can be followed like a trail of breadcrumbs to track what they’ve been up to. Moz and Majestic are tools that are great for doing this. Here’s a look at what Moz found when I looked up Easel.ly, an infographics company.

We at Moz custom-built the Keyword Explorer tool from the ground up to help streamline and improve how you discover and prioritize keywords. Keyword Explorer provides accurate monthly search volume data, an idea of how difficult it will be to rank for your keyword, estimated click-through rate, and a score representing your potential to rank. It also suggests related keywords for you to research. Because it cuts out a great deal of manual work and is free to try, we recommend starting there.
In more sophisticated use cases, geotargeting doesn’t have to be solely based on a consumer’s real-time location. Locations or businesses a customer has visited recently can be a great predictor of interests and intent, so adding targeting based on historical location as well can be key to delivering a captivating, relevant message. Denny’s had great success with this tactic in a campaign with xAd, detailed below.
It works like this – if there is an IP address the company wants to locate, they ping ‎it from a few of their servers, for which they already know the location. A ping is ‎just a way to test if a computer can connect, and how long it takes to do so, but ‎doesn’t transmit any meaningful data. Then, by looking at the time it takes each ‎server to connect, it can establish a shared point or origin, and thereby physically ‎locate the user. It uses the public IP locations to validate their approach and check ‎for anomalies in network latency which would lead to bad data. ‎
It's important to note your competitor's actions over time. For example, if one of your competitors is consistent with pricing, product features, promotion, and their market share it may mean that they're not exploring or exploiting additional market opportunities. Or, if one of your competitors has a decline in sales volume it may mean they will be employing new marketing strategies in the near future and should be monitored closely. Identify the Competitions Strengths and Weaknesses In order to develop effective competitive strategies, you need to make a realistic assessment of your competitors' strengths and weaknesses, as viewed by the market. You need to ask yourself what each of your competitors do very well, better than your own company? Then, ask yourself in what areas are each of your competitors weak. Construct a simple chart. The copier company's might appear like this: Strengths and Weaknesses of Competitors Competitor: Strengths Weaknesses A. Superior customer service 3-year warranty Higher price B. Quick innovator Unique features Higher price Limited distribution channels C. Large market share Lower price Comprehensive ad campaign Viewed as market leader by market segment Slower product No direct access to parts Other Factors to Consider
Conduct Research Professional marketing research, such as focus groups and questionnaires, can provide you with valuable information about your competition. While a marketing research firm can save you time and legwork, it can be quite expensive and simply not a possibility for new and growing businesses. Much of the information you need in order to profile your competitors is readily available to all business owners. As your business grows and expands, you should consider supplementing your own research efforts with some formal research conducted for you by an outside firm. Before you begin seeking out the sources listed below, keep in mind that you need to obtain answers to the following questions:
Stadiums, airports, universities, and malls are examples of specific venues that can be targeted in order to reach specific interest groups. Stadiums provide a great opportunity to focus on specific short engagement events with an audience defined by that event. They often host fans from two specific cities or schools or fans of a specific music genre that is heavy in one demographic. A band like One Direction, for example, is likely to attract school-age female fans.
In the Google Sheets Template, I've provided you with the data points that we'll be collecting, the tools you'll need to do so, and then bucketed the metrics based on similar themes. The data we're trying to collect relates to SEO metrics like domain authority, how much traffic the competition is getting, which keywords are driving that traffic, and the depth of competitors’ backlink profiles. I have built in a few heatmaps for key metrics to help you visualize who's the strongest at a glance.
Some super awesome points here no doubt. What I like about this approach is it is hands on and not just ran via a site being scanned by a third party. Also when a new client comes to you and has these thoughts of ranking the highest in their particular industry you need to know that baseline of who is at the top. Many times when I have conducted a much lesser analysis than what is above I see some items right off the bat that can make that strong competition not so strong after some minor changes.
Great article. This ties in perfectly with the article I just published yesterday. This checklist in conjunction with my competitor analysis, that is more based on keyword and traffic data, will really round out the research stage of your campaign. Taking a deep look at a competitors website just like you would do your own, can be a valuable exercise that drives strategy.
That’s right. Unfortunately, all those slight tweaks to your ad copy and bidding strategies actually do very little in terms of turning leads into customers. So, what exactly should you do to PPC campaigns to maximize conversion potential? Don’t fret—there are actually quite a few things, and we’re going to teach you about each one of them. Below, check out the strategies you should be focusing on to achieve ultimate results.
Google Ads operates on a pay-per-click model, in which users bid on keywords and pay for each click on their advertisements. Every time a search is initiated, Google digs into the pool of Ads advertisers and chooses a set of winners to appear in the valuable ad space on its search results page. The “winners” are chosen based on a combination of factors, including the quality and relevance of their keywords and ad campaigns, as well as the size of their keyword bids.
Even national marketing campaigns can benefit from geo-targeting, as regional differences create opportunities to test multiple messages and refine them as a campaign continues. Geo-targeted experiments has been used successfully by businesses, charities and even political campaigns. Factoring out cultural and ethnic variations, there are still subtle regional differences in something as universal as language. A campaign for donations might be better served by using a “donate” button in one area and a “support” button in another. Similarly, customers might respond differently to the phrase “book your trip” than they do to “buy your ticket” or “schedule your trip.” The same goes for the look and feel of the advertising copy and other content.
It’s easy to get blindsided by our own opinion on “high-quality” content. You might be thinking you have an awesome idea that everyone wants to read about, but how do you know with absolute certainty that it’s really that great? And even if your hunch is spot on and you’ve discovered something truly worth sharing, how do you quantify its value? How do you find the right content marketing keywords?

AdWords may suggest keywords based on your website content. Feel free to use them for inspiration, but also consider the many different ways you and your customers talk about your business and be sure those turns of phrase are reflected in your keywords. Start by creating a list of about 10 “head terms”—the concepts from which everything else you do follows.

Keyword gap analysis is the process of determining which keywords your competitors rank well for that your own website does not. From there, we reverse-engineer why the competition is ranking well and then look at how we can also rank for those keywords. Often, it could be reworking metadata, adjusting site architecture, revamping an existing piece of content, creating a brand-new piece of content specific to a theme of keywords, or building links to your content containing these desirable keywords.